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Greetings!
NACPM WISHES YOU A JOYFUL INTERNATIONAL DAY OF THE MIDWIFE!
 Please join us today, Sunday May 5, 2013, in celebrating midwives and midwifery all around the world. HOW TO CELEBRATE?
The International Confederation of Midwives (ICM) will officially launch world-wide celebrations with the opening speech of the ICM President at the Virtual International Day of the Midwife Conference that goes on for 24 hours. The Virtual Conference is now in progress as it is already May 5th in New Zealand!On Monday the 6th, the ICM and partners from around the world will have a Twitter chat starting at 9:00 am ET. Join whenever you can to magnify the voice of midwives and make us heard all over the world!
 This year the International Day of the Midwife theme will continue to be: The World Needs Midwives Now More than Ever! This overarching theme and the ICM sub-theme that Midwives Save Lives is more relevant than ever around the world and right here at home in the U.S. The U.S. is 50th in world rankings in maternal mortality, in spite of spending more than any other country in the world on maternity care. And outcomes of mothers of color are shockingly disparate, with black mothers being 4 times more likely to die of pregnancy-related complications than white mothers. Midwives are an essential part of the solution to maternal mortality around the world and here at home. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MAMA!
This year's International Day of the Midwife is also the 4th birthday of the Midwives and Mothers in Action (MAMA) Campaign! NACPM, MANA, ICTC, CfM, NARM and MEAC met in Washington, DC to launch the MAMA Campaign on May 5th 2009. Due to MAMA Campaign advocacy and the Affordable Care Act of 2010, licensed CPMs providing services in licensed birth centers must now have their provider fee reimbursed by Medicaid, increasing access for women to the care of midwives.
And watch this spring for the reintroduction of H.R. 1054, the Access to Certified Professional Midwives Act, in the U.S. House of Representatives! The MAMA Campaign partners are determined to ensure that all women have access to CPM care in all settings.
REASONS TO CELEBRATE!
Although there is so much more work that must be done to ensure that women around the world have access to safe care, midwives and mothers and advocates around the country have much to celebrate this year, including:
Indiana legalizes CPMs! Congratulations to all the midwives and advocates who worked against such odds for this victory! From Mary Ann Griffin, April 2013: "We did it! HB1135 passed through the legislature today! Off to the Governor for signing and then onward to the rules and regulations process. This has been twenty years in the making. Indiana will now have legal Certified Professional Midwives!"
Home Birth Summit Review Meeting, April 2013: A cross section of the entire U.S. maternity care system (MDs, midwives, consumers and advocates, policy makers and more) met for two days in Warrenton, Virginia to further the work to implement the 9 consensus statements from the first Home Birth Summit in November, 2011. Click here to learn more about the Home Birth Summit.
The National Birth Center Study II, released in January 2013 with a briefing for members of Congress, reinforces longstanding evidence that midwife-led birth centers provide safe and effective health care for women during pregnancy, labor, and birth, and demonstrated a 6% cesarean section rate for women giving birth in the centers in the study. Click here for more information.
The Institute of Medicine convened a conference entitled "Research Issues in the Assessment of Birth Settings" to review research and practice in all three birth settings: home, birth center and hospital. Recommendations from this conference hold promise for maternal health policy for decades to come. Midwives and CPMs were well represented in the audience, and Brynne Potter, CPM was included as a presenter on provider perspectives. You can access the proceedings of this historic conference here.
Supporting Healthy and Normal Physiologic Childbirth: A Consensus Statement by ACNM, MANA, and NACPM: this historic statement was released in June 2012 by the three U.S. midwifery organizations - ACNM, NACPM and MANA - and gives maternity care providers, policymakers, and women a succinct summary of the evidence for the benefits of normal physiologic childbirth. Watch for the consumer-friendly version of the consensus statement coming soon!
The NACPM leadership team celebrates you as Midwives and all of the Mothers you serve on this joyous day!
Suzy Myers, NACPM President
Mary Lawlor, NACPM Executive Director
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